


The Song of the bird unknown

by RenSual



Category: 19天 - Old先 | 19 Days - Old Xian
Genre: Ambiguity, Angst, As much as comfort is possible in this situation, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Or not, Psychological Horror, Supernatural Elements, angsty sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-13
Updated: 2020-08-13
Packaged: 2021-03-06 08:02:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,173
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25880098
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RenSual/pseuds/RenSual
Summary: He Tian and Guan Shan worked hard to be where they were now. Happy and imperfect together.But then something unfortunate happened, and the life they so carefully built brick by brick started to crumble.This is basically a Tianshan story written in the fantastic genre.I hope you'll enjoy the maze.
Relationships: He Tian/Mo Guanshan (19 Days)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 89





	The Song of the bird unknown

The apartment complex where they lived was surrounded by tall trees, some as fluffy as cotton candy, some dry and long like overgrown insects.

The vivacity of the vegetation was one of the reasons why they chose to settle there. It wasn't a particularly charming neighbourhood, a small concrete maze with typical supermarkets, nothing quaint about them. It wasn't well located either, a little too far from the city centre, where they both worked.  
But the trees offered a small salvation from the grey monotony of the city. Through their windows, the severity of the urban landscape was partially hidden by green veils and brown knots. The sound of the city life, roaring cars and occasional drunken clamors, was dissipated by the low rumble of leaves and the reassuring, stingy chipper of various birds.

He Tian could recognize them, more by habit than by genuine interest. There was a swarm of magpies, their shriek sounding like shattered laugh. Some red collared doves, their bright colours spotting the trees like Christmas decorations. A group of ever-babbling pigeons. His favorite, by far, was the lull of owls, their nocturnal song often coming with the warm serenity of their afterglow, when He Tian's body was just starting to cool down and Guan Shan, still vulnerable in his arms, passed a trembling hand through his dark hair.

It was a chaotic symphony, the sound of every bird mixing together. They talked, called for each other, screamed together in unison. And he only needed to hear them, to concentrate on one particular song to conjure up the name of the bird, it's appearance, the colour of its feathers.

It was a game he played in the evening when he was alone, while he was waiting for Guan Shan, Guan Shan and his undying reflex to take as many work shifts as possible. He closed his eyes and listened. And it came to him as naturally as recognizing a key on a guitar string :  
Magpie, pigeon, magpie again, starling... Then Guan Shan was home and suddenly he couldn't care less about birds.

One evening, for the first time, he failed at this game.  
Between the noise of familiar birds, he heard the song of a bird he didn't know. It was too low-pitched to be a starling, too monotone to be an owl. It was strangely agonizing, as if the bird was completely emptying its lungs with each note. It sounded so out of place, so melancholic, surrounded by the happy chipper of every other birds, other birds He Tian knew the name of. It was infinitely stronger too, as if it came from just below their balcony. It sounded like a complaint, a long blue cry of distress. It almost sounded like a prayer. It sang in three desperate notes and stopped suddenly, as if it disappeared.

By curiosity, he looked through the window but couldn't see it. It was probably nested in the dark leaves of some tree. Then Guan Shan got home and as always, he forgot about everything else.

He Tian heard the song of the unknown bird and only much later did he understood that it was the beginning. It was a sign, a curse, a warning perhaps, and he didn't hear it.

It was small things at first. Things easily missed. A glass of water thought he put next to him but, as he searched for it, found on the counter of the kitchen. A keychain that suddenly disappeared from his keys. A sweater he could swear he put in the closet, and that he found later on the back of a chair.  
Or it was, more significantly, rearranged furniture, a cushion previously on the chair and now on the couch, the TV more inclined to the left than before, a new tablecloth on the living room table he didn't remember buying.

He didn't notice. Or rather, he didn't mind.

In fact, he loved it.  
He loved it because each time it made him remember that he lived with someone, a feeling he forcefully tore out of himself when he was barely a teenager, nowhere near a man.  
But now, each replaced cup, each disturbed object signalled Guan Shan's presence, Guan Shan's hands on them, moving them around with a purpose He Tian could only guess.  
It transformed the apartment into a living being, moving and changing, independent of him, but considering him, revolving partially around him.  
Caring for him.

So days passed, and the wrongness that started to take place didn't cause him any worry. He misread what they were. He thought about them as changes made consciously by his Guan Shan, without consulting him, because Guan Shan was still holding on to crumbs of fierce independence.

He started to worry with a picture.  
It was one of He Tian's favourites:  
he kept it in his wallet, and took great joy on the embarrassment Guan Shan displayed each time he mentioned or looked at it. _Who the hell prints pictures nowadays_ , he would complain, blushing the most tender shade of pink, before scowling like a cat.

Objectively, this picture was of poor quality. It was a little blurry, the landscape cute but uninteresting, a large sea of green grass with an old apple tree, its trunk hunched by the weight of all the apples that grew on it throughout the decades. But it meant a lot, it was the first picture they took together where Guan Shan smiled, where he smiled with the same abandon he had when he cried. Every muscle of his face, every fiber of his skin was dedicated to this smile. It was so rare to capture it like that. So vibrant, so utterly helpless.  
So sometimes, when he fumbled through his wallet, he paused to look at it for a small and reverent moment.

And this is what he was doing the day he noticed it. He was on the couch, looking for a card in his wallet, and gave the picture his usual caress of attention.  
But something was out of place this time. A small wrongness.

He Tian stopped. He could feel something was altered in the picture, even though he couldn't pinpoint what was off. It was one of these "find the difference" enigmas, with only one detail changed. His eyes understood it before his brain could, so he stayed there for a moment, transfixed, hand frozen in mid gesture in his wallet. Uneasiness stared to rise in his throat, and he couldn't tell why.

He Tian took the picture out of his wallet and looked at it closely.  
And he found it.  
On the fields, in the background, were three wind turbines. 

There weren't there before, he was sure of it. Before, it was just them, the apple tree, the field the blue emptiness of the sky.  
But now, unmistakably, they were. Three white, emaciated silouhettes behind them.  
He frowned.

"Babe." He called.

Guan Shan answered from the bedroom."Yeah?" 

"Come take a look at something, please."

He heard Guan Shan grumble uncoherently as he got up. He came to the living room, a finger of his right hand stuck between the pages of the book he was reading.

"What?" He asked, with slight annoyance.

He Tian wordlessly showed him the picture.

Guan Shan came closer and looked down at it, his expression gradually morphing from curious to perplexed.

"What am I looking at?"

Guan Shan didn't see what was wrong. Admittedly, he didn't get to look at this picture half as much as He Tian, but still, he knew it. But, to him, nothing was abnormal. Maybe he didn't pay too much intention, He Tian tried to reassure himself. He insisted. "The wind turbines. Were they always there ?"

Guan Shan scrunched his nose.

"I... think so ?"

Uncertainty was not enough. 

"Think harder, babe." 

Guan Shan looked at him, clueless, before shrugging "Yeah, they always were, I guess. I mean, they can't appear out of nowhere on the picture, right ? "

" 'I guess'? Can you think about it seriously? Or maybe it's too much to ask?" His tone was harsh, he knew, but he couldn't help it.  
Something was going on and Guan Shan wasn't realising, Guan Shan wasn't on his side. Guan Shan was already on the other side of reality.

And of course, Guan Shan, with his old reflexes of wounded animal, instantly lashed out.  
"Why the fuck is it so important, huh ? I don't fucking care ! What difference does the wind turbines make ?" Without waiting for an answer, he stormed off the room, leaving He Tian alone with the picture and the three wind turbines.

They made all the difference, He Tian thought, a lump in his throat.

Because He Tian could swear they weren't there before.  
The cups, the keys, the furniture he wasn't sure. But the picture, he was absolutely positive.  
He tried to look up the field on his phone, to prove himself with hard facts, but the land where they took the picture was so bland he wasn't even sure where that was. It was, for lack of a better word, an anonymous space. It could be anywhere.

He stood there for a moment, phone in his hand, not knowing what to type. Uneasiness rose inside him, slowly poisoning his veins. His brain was in a strange state of semi-trance. Each time he tried to think about the problem, its complete impossibility, its perfectly unlogical nature didn't allow him any semblance of pushed reflexion. It was completely hermetic, impenetrable: the wind turbines weren't supposed to be there but here they were. There was nothing he could add to that. Nothing to be said and nothing to be done. The only thing he could think of is how much he needed to be with Guan Shan right now. Close, as if nothing was tearing them apart.

When he entered the room, Guan Shan was on the bed, lying on his stomach, reading, purposefully ignoring him.  
This scene was so normal, so pathetically reassuring to He Tian that someplace hidden in his heart went completely soft. He laid next to Guan Shan, put an arm around his waist. Guan Shan, still not looking at him, started to struggle.

"Fuck off."

He Tian held him closer. "I'm sorry."

"Fuck. Off."

"Baby..."

There must have been something in his voice, something infinitely pleading, because Guan Sham looked at him, sighed, closed his book and let himself be embraced.

As they laid together silently, He Tian focused on the warmth of Guan Shan's body next to his. How solid, how strangely fragile. But he was still thinking about the three wind turbines. Like tree metallic ghosts, they haunted him. How could they appear like that? Was it some sort of joke ? Or maybe... was He Tian going crazy? But he was so sure they weren't on the picture before, he could swear it. But then how could they appear like that? The questions in his mind were spiralling like a tornado and there was nothing he could do. He was caught in it.

A strange tension going through his muscles. It only made him hold on Guan Shan tighter.  
For a moment, Guan Shan remained unresponsive. At the receiving end of their relationship, as he was used to be. But then his hand, warm and reassuring in the middle of He Tian's tumoil, started to stroke his nape silently. Guan Shan, still pissed, not forgiving him yet, was conforting him. And it was enough to make the tornado still. It didn't disappear, it just stayed in his mind, frozen by the gentle affection of a lover.  
He Tian pressed himself closer, and Guan Shan's heartbeat was as steady as the caress of his hand.

After that, he kept living his life like the wind turbines were always there, behind them, on the picture. What else could he do? 

It was impossible for him to be wrong about the photo, but Guan Shan was right, it was equally impossible for the wind turbines to just magically appear on the background. So he kept living, between this two impossibilities, trying not to think about it. Or, if he did, trying to remember the steadiness of Guan Shan's hand on his nape.

And the other small alterations that continued to happen daily, a piece of furniture out of place, new curtains in the kitchen, objects suddenly found where he didn't left them, he forbid himself to think about it as anything else rather than Guan Shan's actions. Even then, he knew that Guan Shan would have talked to him about some of these changes beforehand. But he persuaded himself. It wasn't like the picture. This was normal. 

He Tian was still destabilized. He couldn't talk to Guan Shan about it, no more than to himself, but he was scared. So he did little things.  
He created little tokens of comfort. Things he was sure he enjoyed, momentums of stability. He went back to the aquarium with Guan Shan, and smiled as the reflects of the water created little waves on their intertwined hands. He made them watch movies they already saw, that they already liked, and took great comfort in knowing exactly what to expect from them. He asked Guan Shan for dishes that had a signification, the first meal he ever made him, the first meal they made together, the meal Guan Shan prepared for their first anniversary, embarrassed and determined about making it the "best fucking jiaohua chiken He Tian ever had in his whole fucking life". Guan Shan seemed a bit puzzled by his sudden burst of nostalgia, but he embraced it all the same. He frowned, accusing He Tian of turning them into an old couple already, but He Tian could see how happiness tugged the corner of his lips as he complained.  
These moments didn't solve the problem but they gave him the sense that there was no problem on the first place. There was only Guan Shan and him, like he wanted, like he planned it since they were fifteen.  
And He Tian didn't ask for anything else.

This time, when He Tian came back home, it was with a box of red pepper flavoured chocolate. It sounded strange, but Guan Shan and him loved it. It reminded them of their trip to Siberia, where the hotel gave samples of this exact chocolate, one per room. He remembered perfectly him and Guan Shan, so jet-lagged they barely felt their own body anymore, trying to steal them from the reception desk, giggling like drunken idiots the whole time.

"Close your eyes and open your mouth." He said to Guan Shan, who, sitting in the kitchen, was listening to something on his phone.

Guan Shan took his eadbuds out and glared at him. "He fucking Tian, if this is one of your perverted ideas-"

He chuckled. "It's not, Momo, I promise. Just be a good boy and open up."

Guan Shan closed his eyes opened his lips, revealing the wet darkness of his mouth, and for a second He Tian regretted promising he wouldn't do anything dirty.

He slipped a piece of the chocolate in Guan Shan's mouth.  
Almost instantly, there was a reaction. Guan Shan's eyes shot open and he spat the chocolate on the floor with a disgusted grunt. 

"What the fuck??" He angrily wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, giving He Tian an accusing glare.

"What's wrong?" He Tian felt clueless. It wasn't the same brand as the ones in Siberia, maybe the taste was off ?

Guan Shan made a bewildered scoff. "What's wrong??? I don't like it and you know that! Did you just want to mess with me ?"

Oh.  
No.

Not that.  
Pictures, objects, landscapes, he could accept anything.

But not his Guan Shan.

"Since when?" He asked, voice tight.

Anger disappeared altogether on Guan Shan's features. Now he just looked lost, and that was infinitely worse. "Huh?"

"Since when don't you like that ?" He Tian repeated. On his side, his fist was gradually clenching. In his chest, his heart did the same.

"Since always? Don't you fucking remember when you tried to make me eat some when we were in Siberia ? I threw a fucking fit !"

"No. You didn't." He didn't, they didn't, didn't he remember? Their body lightenened by sleep, the hotel lobby, their semi-delirious laughter as they have stolen chocolate pieces by pieces.

Guan Shan looked at him. He seemed almost shy, now. "He Tian, I did..."

"You didn't!" He yelled, throwing the box on the floor. He needed Guan Shan to say it, to say he didn't. This wasn't a misplaced object, this wasn't a bowl changing colours, this was their memories. This was sacred, this was untouchable, this was-

"What the fuck is up with you lately ?"

Guan Shan sounded scared.

Realisation washed over him like an epiphany : from Guan Shan's perspective, he must look like a madman. An insane person yelling at his boyfriend because he didn't like chocolate. It didn't make any sense, to Guan Shan.  
If only he knew... It made even less sense for He Tian.

"Nothing." He said.  
He suddenly felt very tired. 

As he left the room, he didn't miss the concerned look Guan Shan threw him.

But something was wrong. He couldn't ignore it any longer. Facts were changing. Things he knew became unknown. It was always small, but it changed. Objects were moving places. Tiny parts of his past were altered.

He went to the hospital, made all the necessary tests but his brain was perfectly healthy, just as the rest of his body. "It might only be stress or sleep depravation", a doctor said, which was the response doctors gave when they were out of prognostic.  
On a strange wavelength, it disappointed him. He would rather be sure to have become insane than drowning in perpetual incertitude.

He didn't say anything to Guan Shan. He didn't want to worry him, especially when nothing could be done.

He tried to live with it.  
It was small details, anyway. Who cared if when he woke up, the bedsheets were bluer than the ones he went to sleep in ?  
Who cared if Guan Shan's bookshelves were suddenly filled with the books of an author he always clamed to hate ?

Sometimes he couldn't even make the difference between this and normal occurrences of daily change. Their downstairs neighbours changed from a quiet couple of old people to an anxious-looking man, always biting his nails and nervously glancing around him.  
And he couldn't tell if they moved or if they were caught up in the distortion of reality He Tian seemed to be in. Was this normal ? If he asked Guan Shan, would he remember the old couple ? Or would he look at him like he did with the chocolate incident?

He Tian didn't ask him. He couldn't face it. Couldn't face Guan Shan worry, Guan Shan's rightfullness to be worried.

It was okay. It really was. He could live like that. Each time an alteration happened, he pushed the bile rising in his throat, the hysterical fear that threatened to take over him and he rationalized endlessly. It was just details, minor things. He could get through this. It was without consequences. It was always things in the background. The smaller pieces of the mosaic that was his life.

It must have been his work schedule who changed that evening, he thought when he got home and Guan Shan wasn't here yet. As always, the fear that curled up around his bones was ignored.

"Mo-zai?" He called.

No answer. Lights were turned off.  
It was strange, Guan Shan should have been back by now. Well, he thought, trying to calm he beating heart. It's nothing. His schedule changed, so what? It didn't matter.

But there was a small noise, a dull little sound coming from the kitchen.  
When he walked in, he understood it's origin: the water tape was running. Next to it, a carrot, on a cutting broad, was half minced. The knife was laying on the left side of it.  
The kichen seemed recently deserted. It was like Guan Shan left in a hurry.  
But even if he did that, he would have at least stopped the tape.  
It was more like he-  
_Like he disappeared._

He Tian needed some fresh air. Right now.  
He went on the balcony and took deep breaths after deep breaths.  
With shaky hands, he tried to call him. It was occupied. He tried to call him again and this time it didn't even ring. His phone just directly made static noise.

He heard another sound, a strangled sob, and realised like an afterthought that it came from himself. His phone dropped from his hands. He pressed his back on the balcony window and let himself break apart.  
He stayed without moving, back against the glass, head in his hands. He was transfixed, his mind was completely empty. He didn't know what to do, what to think.  
So he stayed, even as the wind rose and the owls started their nocturnal songs. He stayed there, feeling like he would rather die, he would rather tear his own heart from his ribcage than feeling so helpless. So full of despair. Feeling like the only thing that prevented him from doing it was the undying hope that Guan Shan was there, somewhere, still.

After some time, he rose. He couldn't tell how many minutes passed, or hours even. Did it matter, he thought bitterly. Maybe it would suddenly change anyway, illogically, irrevocably. Without him.  
He needed to go back inside, to grab a coat, his keys and go look for Guan Shan. To spend his whole life looking for him, and to either find him or find death.

When he stepped back inside, he suddenly smelled it.  
Baked carrots.  
Why? Did Guan Shan.... He went to the kitchen.

The kitchen lights were on, now. And Guan Shan was inside. He Tian's heart tugged painfully.  
He was here, stirring a pot. A delicious odour of home made meal filled the room, as if it was there for quite some time now. As if it was mocking him. As if it was saying "Where have you been ? We have been waiting for you".

Guan Shan gave a little nod towards his direction without looking away from his stirring. "Yo. Finally back?"

When He Tian gave no response, Guan Shan looked up at him and he instantly took an unconscious step back, eyes wide with fear.

To be fair, He Tian must have looked frightening, eyes dark and wide, fists clenched, chest rising and falling with intensity. He felt relief, but more than that he felt angry like he never was before. Almost humiliated.

"He Tian" Guan Shan said, coming closer and bringing a hand to his cheek. "Are you alright ?"

He Tian caught Guan Shan's wrist and squeezed, not caring about the pained hiss he got in response. "Where the fuck were you?"

"Here!" He responded with a panicked voice.

"No, you weren't."

"Yes, I fucking was !"

"Stop messing with me." 

Guan Shan, trying to break free from his hold, answered with a cutting voice. "No! You were there too, you came to the kichen, I said "hey" and you didn't say anything, fucking jerk, then you went outside to make a phone call to God knows who and now you're back and you're freaking out !"

He Tian suddenly dropped his wrist and Guan Shan took two steps back, rubbing it slightly. He continued, voice completely flat. "You weren't there. The kitchen was empty."

Guan Shan's lips trembled. His eyes were reddening. "I can't! I can't...." He repeated over and over, shaking his head with each iteration. Then he fled and He Tian heard the distinct sound of the bedroom door being slammed shut.

He Tian stayed there for a while, still boiling with anger. He was angry and the thing he was angry with was too immaterial, too wordless, so he took it on Guan Shan. And, what was worse, he was still to angry to feel guilty. 

Then a thought came to his mind, sobering him immediately: what if Guan Shan was gone form the bedroom? What if he went there and nothing again? But this time, forever?

He ran to the bedroom. Guan Shan was there, sitting on the side of the bed, head in his hands. His shoulders were shaking.

He Tian sat next to him. He didn't say anything. There was nothing he could have said that would have made the situation better. He just passed a hand around Guan Shan's shoulders. Silently, he hoped that would be enough to go back to pretending.  
It was all he had.  
It was all he had.

"Tell me you're lying." Guan Shan murmured against his fingers.

Ah. Guan Shan and his stubbornness, his incredible, miraculous inability to pretend weren't going to let him get away. 

"Momo..." He said, voice surprisingly soft.

Guan Shan continued. "Tell me you're fucking lying ! Please, He Tian, I won't get mad, I swear, just tell me this is a joke..."

Guan Shan's hands clenched against his chest, grabbing fistfulls of white shirt. He pressed his forehead against He Tian's shoulder and begged. "Tell me it's an horrible joke, I don't care, I won't get mad..."

It was a lie, He Tian knew it. Guan Shan would get mad, relief-mad, like he got worried-mad, or mad-happy, like he was able to lace anger with any feeling. 

"It's not a joke." He softly said. And just with this words, he didn't feel angry anymore. He only felt calmness going through his body, flattening every feeling. Finally he was facing it, and it was the cold relief, the only small oasis he could afford. The eye of the tornado, where no wind blown , where he was destined to go back into the spiralling tempest any minute now, but before that he had this moment of peace.

A stark contrast to his momentary well-being. Guan Shan stared at him, with silent horror. His shoulders were squared and his lips made a thin, unforgiving line.

"Okay." He simply said.

He stood and moved around the room, took a sweater from the closet. And of course, He Tian didn't recognize it. "Get your coat, we're going to the hospital."

"No."

Guan Shan spun to face him. His eyes were insistent. "He Tian, we need to- you're unwell. You've been for some time now. We need to go, come with me."

"I went there already." At the admission, Guan Shan let go of the sweater like it didn't even exist in the first place. His eyes widened.

"Why didn't you tell me ?"

He Tian shrugged. 

"Why- why did they say?" Guan Shan spoke with hopeful eyes, looking down at He Tian like there was a solution. Like the answer to this question, no matter how horrible, would stop the insanity of this situation.

Looking at Guan Shan's hopeful, pleading eyes, He Tian wanted to laugh. It seemed so ridiculous for him to have such hope, the same he had months ago, the same that he deserted long ago. And now seeing it on Guan Shan, he found it cute, a bit stupid, even. Endearing. God, he felt so calm. "They couldn't find anything wrong."

And at Guan Shan's crestfallen expression, he couldn't hold it anymore. He laughed. He laughed and Guan Shan looked at him doing it, shoulders more and more squared. He expected Guan Shan to yell at him. To cruse at him, to hit him until he stopped laughing like a maniac. But instead, Guan Shan walked to the bed, sat back where he previously was, looked at He Tian like he was seeing him for the last time and started crying.

"Hey, don't cry." Guan Shan cried still. He held him.

"Mo Guan Shan... don't cry, please." Guan Shan didn't listen. He kept crying, soundlessly. 

"You believe me, right?" He asked him quietly. "I'm not lying. I'm not doing this to hurt you."

"Yeah, b-but-" Guan Shan managed to say between sobs, before being choked by tears again. He made a visible effort to calm himself.

"But then what the fuck does it mean?" He managed to say. He turned to face He Tian, and seemed to immediately realise that He Tian couldn't give him any answer. So he came closer, put his arms around his neck and begged.

"Kiss me, please, kiss me..." He was shivering for contact, absolutely desperate to be with He Tiam in the most intimate way he could think of and, obliging as ever, as desperate as his lover, He Tian complied.

And for the next, feverish hour they didn't think about it. They didn't think about anything, in fact.  
And this time, if Guan Shan cried, it was only because He Tian was biting the inside of his thighs, because he was suddenly being invaded, because He Tian was merciless, pushing him harder against the mattress, trapping him completely, splitting him open.

And it stopped, this moment, it stopped too soon, too hurriedly, because both of them were too scared to not rush it desperately. The frenzy was followed by a blessed white minute were nothing existed except the core of their climax, and then they both slumped on the bed, breathing heavily, the weight of their body slowly coming back to them.

They stayed like that in the bed, Guan Shan's cries reduced to silent tears, He Tian looking up at the ceiling.

After a moment, He Tian slowly rose, grabbed a pack of cigarettes from the nightstand. He went to the window, opened it and lit up a cigarette. His thoughts were finally clear. Lucid. 

Maybe Guan Shan was right. Maybe he was unwell. Crazy.  
But maybe neither of them were wrong.  
Maybe Guan Shan's reality and his were starting to drift away. Like two boats, coming from the same harbour but gradually losing sight of each other in the immensity of the sea. Maybe something had happened, something incomprehensible, something starting with an enigmatic song, and now they were just diverging from each other.  
And it was stronger and stronger too, it ate away more and more pieces of his reality. And now it was consuming the central one, his love, Guan Shan.

But then, what if Guan Shan didn't come back, one day? Or what if he became someone else altogether? Someone who didn't love him? Who he didn't love?  
What were the details that made Guan Shan the person he loved so much ?

He Tian heard the bedsheets ruffle and turned his head. Guan Shan had stopped crying. He was sitting now, and his eyes, in the diminishing light, were calm and intense. Attentive. Two rubies considering He Tian silently. Completely impenetrable.

Heart as heavy as gold, He Tian pointlessly wondered if he was still the same Guan Shan he held so dearly in his arms moments ago.

Outside, the unknown bird started singing again.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading this.
> 
> This is the produce of my love for the fantastic genre. I hope you enjoyed it, although I know it's not everyone's cup of tea! (If it is, I highly recommend reading Haruki Murakami, or Guy de Maupassant. They are both my inspiration for this fic!)
> 
> Tell me your thoughts.  
> Do you think their condition can be cured ? Do you think He Tian is just plain crazy?  
> Or if he's not, what will stay?  
> Do you think He Tian and Guan Shan's love will?  
> I'll let you decide for yourself


End file.
